National Register of Social Housing - Third-party Intellectual Property

The request was successful.

Hello,

I am writing to request some information under the Freedom of Information Act.

These questions relate to National Register of Social Housing, which you are making available for reuse under the Open Government Licence at http://data.gov.uk/dataset/national-regi.... I am trying to ascertain whether there is any third-party intellectual property in the address information within that dataset that is not covered by the licence.

Specifically, I am trying to find out:

1. To your knowledge, does the dataset contain any information that is copyright Royal Mail, or data over which Royal Mail has a database right?

2. To your knowledge, does the dataset contain any information that is copyright Ordnance Survey, or data over which Ordnance Survey has a database right?

I appreciate it might be hard to give a clear answer to either of these questions because they may venture into areas of legal uncertainty (for example about the extent of Royal Mail's copyright or database rights). Therefore please answer the following:

1. How was the database behind the published dataset first created, specifically:

a. Who created it, when, and from what sources?
b. Was the Postcode Address File from Royal Mail or AddressBase from Ordnance Survey, or any predecessor products to AddressBase, or any products incorporating these products, used as a source of addresses when creating the dataset?
c. Were any of these products used to check, validate or correct addresses from another source when the original database was created?

2. How is the database behind the published dataset updated, specifically:

a. What sources of information are used to update the database?
b. Are updates from Royal Mail or Ordnance Survey used to provide updates to the database?
c. Do you check, validate or correct addresses in updates to the database against either the Postcode Address File from Royal Mail or AddressBase from Ordnance Survey, or any service that uses those databases as its source?

3. Have you taken legal advice prior to making this data available under the Open Government Licence that by doing so you are not infringing third-party intellectual property rights?

I am submitting this request publicly through WhatDoTheyKnow in order to ensure that there is a public, referenceable record of your response.

Thank you in advance,

Stuart Harrison

FoI Requests,

FOI REF NO:F0008087

Thank you for your email. We are currently processing your request. Please quote the reference number above in any further correspondence regarding this request.
Freedom of Information Team
Department for Communities and Local Government

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Sarah Webb,

1 Attachment

Hello,

 

I have attached an acknowledgement of your request.

 

Cheers,

Sarah

 

Sarah Webb
Operational Researcher/Statistician
Neighbourhoods Analysis - Policy through better evidence
Department for Communities and Local Government, Zone 4/J4, Eland House,
Bressenden Place, London SW1E 5DU / Tel: 0303 444 1861 /
[1][email address] / [2]www.gov.uk/dclg

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Steve Peters,

2 Attachments

Please find attached my response to your request of 11^th August regarding
the above.

 

[1]DCLG_CMYK_AW Steve Peters
Strategic Statistics Division | Analysis and Innovation
  Directorate
0303 444 2333 | 07899 060 776

Follow us: @[2]CommunitiesUK  | [3]http://gov.uk/dclg
Follow me:  @[4]Open_Data /
[5]http://openviz.wordpress.com

[6]http://opendatacommunities.org Paving the way to open,
re-usable data

 

 

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Communications via the GSi may be automatically logged, monitored and/or
recorded for legal purposes.

References

Visible links
2. https://twitter.com/communitiesuk
3. http://gov.uk/dclg
4. https://twitter.com/open_data
5. http://openviz.wordpress.com/
6. http://opendatacommunities.org/